Divorce
by Raven Shadowrose
Summary: Jeff thinks about his marriage to Lucy on the cusp of their divorce.


**Title: Divorce**

**Author: Raven Shadowrose**

**Rating: K**

**Pairing: None**

**Summary: Jeff is thinking about his marriage to Lucy on the cusp of their divorce.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters from Casualty, the story and any original characters are my property and I do not give permission for them to be used.**

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Divorce, it's an ugly word, it's the final nail in the coffin of the relationship that I once had with Lucy. She didn't even have the decency to tell me to my face that she wanted out of our marriage. All I got was one lousy text message on the day that the divorce papers came through. She had obviously been planning this for a while, behind my back, with my so-called mate. It hurts that she has been making plans to marry someone else and take my kids away from me. I know that she wants to hurt me, she wants to make me suffer. All she has to do is make it so that I can't see Sophia and John and that will hurt me the most.

The thought of not being able to see Sophia and John sends a cold, icy feeling down my spine, I need to be with my kids. I don't know what to do, I don't know how I can work it out to that I can be with my kids. I have gone through every logical scenario in my head several times over and none of them work out how I want them to. I have to work it out, I have to find a way to be with Sophia and John. Lucy wants to take them to London, if she does that then I won't see them. What am I going to do? Why does Lucy want to hurt me in this way? I've known about her and my best mate for years, I have turned the other way and ignored what they've been getting up to.

I know that I've not been squeaky clean myself, I know that I've cheated and gone behind Lucy's back with other women. I know that I should have behaved differently, cheating didn't make me feel good about myself anyway. I wonder if Lucy felt that way, did she care that she was breaking our marriage vows when I was out working? Did she care that there was a place inside me that still loved her? I say was, because I can't love her now, it is too painful. If I love her then I fear that my heart will break and I won't be able to carry on. I won't be able to fight for my kids.

My lawyer tells me that it is likely that Lucy will be given permission to take Sophia and John to London as she is their main carer. Am I being punished for my actions? Is this happening because I gave into my hurt and my anger, because I wanted to give Lucy a taste of her own medicine? I'm not sure that it worked, I stayed out all night and yet she treated it as though I had been working all night. She didn't ask where I had been, she wasn't interested. I didn't feel good about what I had done, I felt as if I had betrayed my children, I felt as if I had let them down. I don't think that they know what I did, I hope that they don't know. I've given in to my anger and my pain more than once, I wanted Lucy to feel the pain that I was feeling. I wanted her to acknowledge that I was suffering because she was going behind my back with my friend. Every time that she ignored the times that I stayed out late it just made me angrier. I wanted to hurt her, I wanted more than her cold indifference to what I was doing.

I stopped having the one night stands when she threw me out, they weren't achieving what I wanted them to. I didn't see the point in carrying on with them. I wasn't allowed to see my kids, Lucy refused point blank to let me in the house. I remember her saying that she didn't care where I went, that she wanted me out of the house. I've sat nearby and watched Lucy as she moved my best mate into the house, he has taken my place. He spends every evening with my kids, I should be with them, I am their dad. I don't know what good it will do me sitting outside and watching them all. Lucy is trying to replace me, has she got Sophia and John calling him dad already? Will they remember that I am their dad, will they forget me now that I am no longer there? I don't want Sophia and John to forget me, I love them, I need them, I am their dad.

I've thought about giving up being a paramedic, if I did that then I would be able to look after Sophia and John. I would be able to take them to school and pick them up again. I know that my night shifts and long hours are against me. How is that fair? How is that working to provide for my kids is going against me? Why isn't there a way that I can stop this from happening? Am I going to have to give up my job? How will I provide for Sophia and John without any money coming in? Am I going to have to choose between providing for Sophia and John and letting them go? What job is going to bring enough money in so that I can provide a comfortable life for them? How will I cope with being a single parent? If I give up my job is there any guarantee that the court will grant me custody of my children? What if they turn me down and still give Sophia and John to Lucy? If I stay working as a paramedic then I can give Sophia and John the life that they deserve, it will mean that I have to let them go to London though. If I let them go then they will have a stable life, the life that I cannot give to them if I choose to stay working as a paramedic. I don't like this choice, I wish that I could turn back the clock and make things work out differently.

There was a time when things weren't all bad between us, we were happy, just like any other couple. I met Lucy on a night out with some mates, we started dating not long after that night. I thought that she was what I wanted, she was pretty and she was blonde. My mates encouraged me to go out with her, they thought that she was attractive and they were all jealous of me. I like that they were jealous, I was young and I was very naive. There were times when Lucy would go silent on me, mainly if I didn't take her where she wanted to go. We mostly had a good time together and I liked having a woman on my arm that my mates were jealous of. My family were happy, they liked Lucy, she acted differently in front of them. She was able to twist them around her little finger very easily. We'd been seeing each other for a year when Lucy moved in with me, everyone thought that it was for the best. I privately agreed with them, Lucy had been acting differently, she was nicer than she had been in a long time.

We had been living together for a month or two when Lucy came to me with the news that she was pregnant. I didn't know what to say, she had always been on the pill. I wasn't sure how it had happened. There's always a part of me that wondered if she had got pregnant on purpose, if she doubted that I would stay with her. When my father heard that Lucy was pregnant, he told me that I had to propose to her, that I had to do the right thing. He wasn't going to take no for an answer, I didn't have a choice. I did as my father asked and proposed to Lucy, she looked as if she was expecting my proposal. I still wonder if she had planned the pregnancy as a way to keep me.

We were married a few months later, it was a simple affair in the registry office with just our families attending it. Lucy was almost due to give birth so we didn't have a honeymoon. I was terrified when she went into labour, I didn't know what to do. I took her to hospital and I stayed with her as she gave birth to our son. I named him, it was the one thing that I could do for him. Whenever Lucy fed John she wouldn't let me in the room, I wasn't allowed to watch. I asked a few times if I could watch, Lucy always got angry, I gave up asking her in the end. I came to accept that I wouldn't be allowed to see Lucy share that intimate moment with our son. I kept my feelings inside. I made the most of the time that I got to spend with John when I wasn't working.

John was a year old when I saw an advertisement in the newspaper, they were looking for trainee paramedics. The decorating business wasn't going well, it was barely paying the bills. I kept the advertisement and I applied for a position a few days before the closing date. I didn't tell Lucy about it until I was sure that I had got a place. When I did tell her she wasn't too pleased that I had gone behind her back, as she put it. She was only happier when I told her that the wages were higher than what I had previously been earning. I started my training and I was working long hours to get in everything that I needed to know. I worked hard, I was determined to make something of my life so that my son would be proud of me. I was tired after coming back from work each day, Lucy wasn't very supportive. I just put it down to her being tired, she was looking after our son and I thought that looking after him was tiring her out. I tried to be supportive of her, she didn't take it too well though. There were times when she would accuse me of patronising her.

I completed my training and was offered a position at the local ambulance station, I took it and I began my work as a technician. I worked hard, I was glad that I had been given a chance to make something of my life. There were times when I was tired, I was working twelve hour shifts and studying towards the paramedic exam. I tried my best to pay attention to Lucy and what she was saying to me. I usually lost track when she started talking about her friends, she was working part time and she usually spent the money on clothes or going out for coffee. There were times when Lucy would accuse me of not listening to her, it would lead to arguments. I was angry that she was spending money whenever she felt like it. She promised to stop and to try and get more hours at work. I thought that it would all be all right after that. Lucy was as good as her word, she got more hours and she stopped going out with her friends for a while.

Things had improved between myself and Lucy, she talked about wanting another child. she was insistent, she wanted a girl, she wanted a child of each gender. I don't know what made me agree, we were getting along better and I thought that having another child would cement our new relationship. Lucy got pregnant quickly and she gave birth to Sophia when John was two years old. Lucy named Sophia, she said that it was her right as her mother. Looking after a baby and a toddler was hard on us both, I was working towards being a paramedic and Lucy was looking after the kids. She often blamed me for not being there. I passed the paramedic exam despite the distractions at home. I was still doing long hours, I didn't have a choice, I had my shifts and I had to work them.

When Sophia was a year old, I heard a rumour that Lucy had been seeing someone behind my back. Our mutual friends had seen her out with someone, some of them had even seen her bringing him back to our house. Lucy denied it, she said that he was just a friend that she had met at the playgroup. I believed her, to this day I don't know if what she told me was true or not. Was he the first man that she cheated on me with? I don't know how many men that she cheated with, it could be a few or it could be many. I put it out off my mind, I concentrated on working and earning money for my kids. They were my motivation to keep working through the bad days.

John was six and Sophia was four when I got offered a transfer to Holby, I talked to Lucy and we decided to take it. There had been more rumours about Lucy being unfaithful, she brushed it off as people being jealous of our relationship. I still believed her, I didn't want to believe that she had been cheating on me. I thought that the move to Holby would do us good, that it would give us a chance to start again. Things were good for a while, we had a bigger house and Lucy had a part time job now that the kids were at school. I thought that she was happy. I was happy at Holby, I had a good friend in Dixie, she understood me, we had the same weird sense of humour. I worked with Dixie a lot, our friendship became stronger over time.

I started to realise that something wasn't right with Lucy, she was distant and whenever I went to hug her or kiss her she barely responded to me. I was worried, it was on my mind. I started to keep my eyes open and whenever I had a day off I would go out and watch the house from afar. One day I saw my friend go to our house, Lucy came to the door and she kissed him, she took him into our house and he came out an hour later. I knew that she was cheating on me with my mate. I didn't know what to do about it. I ignored it in the hope that it would go away, I hoped that she would stop seeing him and come back to me. This went on until Sophia was eight and John was ten, I couldn't ignore it any longer. Our children had noticed what their mother was up to, they had mentioned that their mum had had a friend around a lot. I didn't know what to say to them, I kissed them goodnight and went to bed. Lying next to Lucy felt like a lie, she had been lying to me for a long time. Sleeping was very hard for me that night.

I confronted Lucy one day, she confessed everything, she had been seeing Alan on and off for years. All of the rumours had been true. That was the day that she threw me out. I tried to keep it from Dixie and the others, I didn't want them to know how badly I had messed up my marriage. I've kept it a secret until now. The divorce papers have been sat on the table, the lawyer tells me that I have to sign them. I put my name on them earlier, now I feel empty inside. I called Dixie and asked her to come here. I need her right now, I don't want to be alone.

The knock on the door takes me out of my thoughts, I let Dixie in and she looks around the room. 'What are you doing here mate?'

'Look on the table.' I saw Dixie look at me curiously and she went over to the table, she picked up the divorce papers and she looked through them. 'Jeff, why didn't you tell me?'

'I didn't know how to.'

'Is it definitely over?'

'She's marrying someone else.'

'Oh mate, I'm sorry.' The concern in Dixie's voice gets to me and I try to hide the fact that I am crying from her. I know that she knows I'm crying. I felt Dixie's arms wrap themselves around me and she stroked my back. 'All right love, I've got you.' I bury my head into Dixie's shoulder, I need her now more than ever before. Dixie just holds me, I take comfort from her holding me.

I took a shaky breath and moved away from Dixie so that I could wipe the tears from my eyes. 'Come on Jeff, get your things, you can come and stay with me.'

'Dixie, I can't.'

'Why not?'

'Won't I be in the way?'

'Of course not, come on, this is a one time offer.'

'Okay.' I pack up my things and put them into my bag.

'Do you have everything?'

'Yeah, everything else is still at home.' I force the last word out, it is hard for me to say it.

'Don't worry about that now, we'll sort it.'

'Thanks Dixie.'

'Don't worry about it, that's what friends are for.' Dixie puts her arm around my shoulder, I am grateful that she is here with me and helping me. Just maybe I can get through these horrible days with my best friend by my side.

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**Poor Jeff :(**


End file.
